While Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Phoenix gets all the media attention for his crackdown on illegal immigrants, eight deputies in an unremarkable office at the Harris County Jail are posting similar numbers for deportation -- and doing so without controversy.

Working two per shift, the deputies refer roughly 1,000 suspected illegal immigrants to federal Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) authorities every month, helping to make the Southern District of Texas by far the busiest in the nation for illegal-immigration prosecutions.

Accusing the federal government of hampering local attempts to combat illegal immigration, state Sen. Russell Pearce, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and some of Arizona's most hawkish public figures on border security pledged on Wednesday to redouble their efforts with new legislation and a citizens initiative.

Yet the fact remains that this is not an issue we can continue to ignore - both because of the presence of so many illegals and because we rely on talented immigrants to fuel our economy. We dare not close our borders to the skilled and ambitious immigrants on whom we historically have relied, as the mayors of London and New York recently emphasized.

... But E-Verify also can serve as the foundation of a grand immigration compromise, one that combines a deterrent to future illegal immigration (by extending the system and making it mandatory); gradual legalization, with conditions, for those illegals already here; and the prospect of border control that can let us give preference to high-skilled immigrants from around the world eager to work in the United States rather than having our new immigration overwhelmingly dominated (as it now is) by those from Mexico and Central America.

The man who likes to call himself "America's toughest sheriff," Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., is planning a Friday showdown with the feds.

The sheriff has announced he will defy the U.S. Department of Homeland Security by doing a street sweep for illegal immigrants one day after the expiration of the agreement that has permitted him to conduct such operations for the past three years. The sheriff has said he expects the deal not to be extended, though federal officials have remained publicly noncommittal.

The Arkansas attorney general's office has cleared the way for signature-gathering by supporters of a proposed ballot measure requiring government agencies to verify that all those seeking public benefits in the state are legal U.S. residents.

The Obama administration has repealed a rule that would have threatened employers with prosecution unless they fired workers whose Social Security numbers did not match entries in a government database, ending a two-year battle in a San Francisco federal court.

Although the Department of Homeland Security formally withdrew the "no-match" rule Wednesday, the administration is supporting another program enabling employers to check workers' names against electronic records that are supposed to screen out illegal immigrants.

As jobs vanish in the global financial crisis, Caribbean governments are cracking down on undocumented migrants seeking work. The increased enforcement highlights deep economic divisions in a region where poor Dominicans, Haitians and Jamaicans seek better lives on more affluent islands such as the Bahamas, Antigua and Barbados.

The number of Cubans attempting to cross the Florida Straits has fallen by more than half, putting 2009 on track to be perhaps the lowest for migration from the communist island in almost a decade.

Experts say it is hard to pinpoint what has caused such a drastic drop but they attribute it to a combination of factors, with the U.S. economic downturn topping the list. They also point to stepped-up U.S. law enforcement against smugglers, eased U.S. restrictions on Cuban-Americans who want to travel to the island and send money to family there and a clampdown by the Cuban government.

All inmates booked into jails throughout Los Angeles County will have their immigration status checked beginning today, but federal officials said they don't have the resources to deport all illegal immigrants with criminal records who are identified.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement will prioritize illegal immigrants with past convictions for violent crimes, including murder, rape, kidnapping and robbery. Though immigration officials plan to assess every case individually, they said some with less serious criminal records may be released back into the community.

Despite Mr. Obama's promises that the stimulus plan would be transparent and free of politics, the government is handing out $720 million for border upgrades under a process that is both secretive and susceptible to political influence. This allowed low-priority projects such as the checkpoint in Whitetail, Mont., to skip ahead of more pressing concerns, according to documents revealed to the Associated Press.

It wasn't supposed to be that way. In 2004, Congress ordered the Department of Homeland Security to create a list, updated annually, of the most important repairs needed at checkpoints nationwide. But the Obama administration continued a Bush administration practice of considering other, more subjective factors when deciding which projects get money.

Sixty-eight percent of Americans oppose sanctuary cities and 50% believe that the policies lead to an increase in crime.

Sixty-five percent of the respondents say they follow news stories that involve sanctuary cities; 28% say they follow them very closely. When asked about the creation of sanctuary cities, only 13% of respondents favor their creation.

Forty-nine percent of Americans support cutting off federal funding to sanctuary cities, while 33% oppose a cutoff.

Sixty-one percent of Arizona voters approve of the job that Sheriff Joe Arpaio is doing in Maricopa County. Sixty percent disagreed with the federal governments decision to restrict Arpaio's immigration enforcement efforts.

A Gallup poll released on August 5, 2009 shows that 50% of all Americans believe that immigration should be reduced.  This number is 11 points higher than the figure from an identical poll conducted last year.  Only 14% of Americans say immigration should be increased (down from 18%) and 32% say immigration levels should remain the same (down from 39%).

Fifty-one percent of Arizona voters say it is more important for Congress to pass immigration reform than health care reform.

By a 65% to 20% margin, Arizona voters believe enforcing the borders is more important than legalizing the status of those already living here. Half of the state’s voters (50%) think it is possible to put an end to illegal immigration, while 34% do not.

A new Rasmussen poll shows that 66% of likely voters believe that the government should improve border enforcement and reduce illegal immigration.  However, only 32% of America's "Political Class" agree.

The poll also shows that 77% of likely voters believe that illegal aliens should not be able to receive driver's licenses and 73% of Americans believe that police officers should automatically check to see if someone is in this country legally when that person is pulled over for a traffic violation. 

Sixty-two percent of state residents oppose granting illegal immigrants some type of limited driver's license, according to a Monmouth University/Gannett New Jersey poll.

Only 32 percent said children of illegal immigrants deserved in-state tuition rates, while 20 percent favored the lower rates for illegal immigrants themselves.

Seventy-three percent (73%) of U.S. voters believe that a police officer should automatically check to see if someone is in this country legally when the officer pulls that person over for a traffic violation. Only 21% disagree, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.

Sixty-seven percent (67%) of voters also say that if law enforcement officers know of places where immigrants gather to find work, they should sometimes conduct surprise raids to identify and deport illegal immigrants. Twenty-four percent (24%) oppose surprise raids.

In a Washington Post/ABC Poll released just before Barack Obama's inaguration, respondents ranked immigration No. 10 on a list of priorities for the administration. The economy, Iraq War, foreign policy and education were all ranked ahead of immigration. Twenty-one percent said that it was the highest priority, 48 percent said it was high priority, while 29 percent said it was low priority.

When asked about what governments should do to address illegal immigration, 83% of respondents supported stronger border controls, 74% supported cracking down on employers, and 68% supported deportation.

Only 32% of Obama voters considered his support for amnesty as a factor in their decisions to vote for him. 67% said it was either not a factor at all, or they voted for Obama in spite of his stance on amnesty.

60% of voters said reducing illegal immigration and cracking down on employers who hire them is important to them, while only 21% supported "legalizing or creating a pathway to citizenship" for illegal aliens.

57% of voters stated that amnesty would harm American workers and further strain public resources, while only 26% believe amnesty would aid economic recovery and ease public burdens.